| Thursday, February 13, 1997 | NORTHWEST ENERGY |
NWPPC Conference Room, |
Next Meeting: March 13 in Spokane, Washington.
• ENTER THE LATEST WORK PLAN, WITH A NEW F&W SECTION -- Staffer Dick Watson explained that at the previous meeting, the board had asked staff to revise the fish and wildlife (F&W) and river governance sections of the draft work plan and do more work on the timelines. He described the goals and milestones of the timelines for Federal Power Marketing, Transmission, and Consumer Access/Public Purposes. In the F&W and River Governance timeline, we are trying to respond to the Comprehensive Review's call for five-year F&W budgets and recommendation that the governors initiate a broadly based discussion on improving the system for making river governance decisions, he reported.
• A QUINTET COMMENTS ON THE DRAFT -- Rob Walton of the Public Power Council said government-to-government relationships with tribes from the beginning are necessary to make the next round of F&W budget discussions succeed. John Saven of Northwest Requirements Utilities said it is important to determine what the business interests of BPA and its customers are and to solve problems associated with them before reaching a conclusion about what legislation is needed to aid the subscription process. Steve Weiss of the Northwest Conservation Act Coalition urged the Transition Board to be pro-active at the state level to acquaint legislators with the Comprehensive Review. The federal backup for public purposes recommended by the Review is still very important to us, he noted. Angus Duncan of the Columbia/Pacific Policy Institute for Energy and the Environment said the river governance process needs to move quickly because river governance decisions have long lead times, because there are decisions being made or foregone now that will limit subsequent decisions that can be made on the river, and because moving ahead with river governance will relieve thepressure in other F&W forums to hold small decisions hostage to large decisions. Alfred Canada of Grants Pass, Oregon, submitted a report calling for solar voltaic generation to be integrated into the BPA federal system by the year 2000.
• PLAN MODIFIED, THEN APPROVED -- Todd Maddock suggested the plan discuss how to measure whether competition is occurring in rural areas. Mike Kreidler expressed concern that others in the region hadn't had sufficient opportunity to participate in developing the F&W timetable and about the Transition Board's role in the river governance process. He recommended the plan be more specific about the federal backup for public purposes and address the issue of stranded costs. Roy Hemmingway stated that the plan's timetable is too slow and that the Northwest "needs to decide what it wants to do before the nation decides what the Northwest should do" in federal legislation. The board approved the draft work plan as a "living document," indicating that further changes will be made as needed. We want to make sure people know that the F&W section is still tentative and that there is a lot of latitude, said Transition Board chair John Etchart.
• IndeGO: GETTING BIGGER AND MOVING FAST -- Kellan Fluckiger of Idaho Power said IndeGO started with seven signatories and now is up to 15, including Seattle City Light and Tri-State G&T. Our timeline calls for the initial IndeGO proposal to be completed by March 7, with public forums starting March 17, he pointed out. We intend to file with FERC and in seven Northwest states by July 15, Fluckiger stated. Vickie VanZandt of BPA said the IndeGO issues that need resolution include reliability, efficiency, and pricing. There are a lot of concerns and no easy answers, she said. Scott Brattebo of PacifiCorp noted IndeGO now includes Wyoming, Utah, and a portion of Nevada and of Colorado. When you think of IndeGO, don't just think of the four Northwest states -- it's much larger, he said. Steve Larson of BPA said the IndeGO contract has to ensure that BPA can pay Treasury, and if it can't, the question is, is there an exit ramp?
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Please Note: This summary is based on detailed reports of the meetings of the Northwest Energy Review Transition Board. The reports are prepared by Resource Writers Inc. and distributed by the Northwest Power Planning Council. To request a copy, please call the Council at 1-800-452-5161 and ask for Public Affairs.